007 Travelogue: Wasserburg am Inn (GERMANY) 2024

March 18, 2025 0 By 007 Travelers

We spent the morning in Munich and then turned our car towards Wasserburg am Inn. Why was this small village so interesting?

Bond visits here in John Gardner‘s book “SeaFire“, 1994 and he drives to Wasserburg in the VW Corrado he rented from Munich. We followed his footsteps in our own rental car Seat Arona and arrived at a beautiful village at noon. All quotes in this travelogue are from the aforementioned John Gardner’s 007 book.

Wasserburg am Inn is a town in the district of Rosenheim in Upper Bavaria, Germany. The historic center is a peninsula formed by the meandering Inn River. Many medieval structures have remained intact, which gives the city a unique view.

“Another call assured him of a rental car that he could pick up at the Munich airport, and lastly he dialed a final German number – the Hotel Paulanerstuben, in Wasserburg am Inn. Its main draw was the address, Marienplatz 9 – the same square in which the Tarn lawyers, Saal, Saal u. Rollen, had their offices.”

—

“He was on the road by just after six-thirty, and by seven had left the outskirts of Munich far behind, heading out on the B-304. Before eight o’clock he came into Wasserburg, which seemed to rise from the light morning mists like a great, faded ancient galleon.

With its untouched, medieval atmosphere, the town appeared to be surrounded by water from the river Inn. Wasserburg was built within a few yards of a tight lazy curve in the river, which nuzzles the southern limits of the town’s center and enfolds its eastern boundary with great crags of rock, plunging straight down to the gentle flowing water below.”

“He drove the Corrado into the large parking lot on the northern bank of the river and set off on foot for the traffic-free town center, his garment bag over his shoulder. He walked quickly through the narrow lanes until they spilled out into the Marienplatz, the very center of the town, with its Gothic brick town hall and the fourteenth-century Frauenkirche.”

“He stopped on the edge of the square, listening to the soft flush of the river less than a hundred yards away, while taking in the extraordinary timelessness of the view. He even caught sight of what remains of the castle, to the south, from which Wasserburg – Water Castle – takes its name.

The town was already bustling: a cassocked priest walked from the Frauenkirche, with its old watchtower, while the few old shops were open and local people could be seen hurrying to them, or leaving with baskets of fresh bread and other produce.”

“At the Paulanerstuben they showed no surprise at this guest arriving at eight in the morning, but welcomed him in, showed him his pleasant room overlooking the square, and offered him a second breakfast, which he accepted, ruminating on the many four-star hotels throughout the world where he had been treated as a pariah when arriving this early in the day.”

“Assenting to a second breakfast was not a matter of greed but a way to engage the one elderly waiter in conversation, so the meal passed with skirmishes of dialogue. Bond’s German was excellent enough for him to pass as a native, and the exchanges yielded several useful pieces of information. The local people were slightly reserved when it came to foreigners, and he soon learned that this conservative trait had reached a high level during the week.”

Bond stayed at the Paulanerstuben hotel, so we had to stay there too 🙂

More about our visit to Gasthof Paulanerstuben here

Accommodation: Hotel Gasthof Paulanerstuben

Address: Marienplatz 9, Wasserburg am Inn

Room type: Triple room with shower, toilet, TV, WLAN

Price: 139 EUR / 1 night / 3 persons (including breakfast)

Booking: Via the hotel’s own website

“After breakfast he returned upstairs, surprised that such an old and beautiful building actually provided telephones in the few available rooms. The local directory was not large, and he found the number of Saal, Saal u. Rollen. Within seconds of dialing, he was speaking to Herr Fritz Saal, explaining that he was a British businessman looking for perhaps a large property in the area. An investment, you understand. For a consortium, you will follow. Naturally, Herr Boldman.

The building from which the Saal brothers and Herr Rollen carried out their business, while obviously very old, had been constantly renovated over several centuries.

Initially, the building had probably been a small town-house for some local worthy. From the half-timbered exterior and the visible leaded windows, he reckoned that it probably had a largish entrance hall, with rooms to left and right, while upstairs it possibly maintained what had originally been three bedrooms.”

We spent time in a nice little village and found some interesting places that were probably the ones John Gardner referred to in his book.

We also found a “SPECTRE” car in the parking lot 🙂

Further away was another parking lot, which was perhaps the one where Bond had left his car and where in the book had a chase between Bond and the villains.

“Turning, he headed to the parking lot where he had left the car. Given what he intended to do that night, he thought it would be as well to look over the landscape – in particular the escape routes.

He opened the car and rummaged around in the front for a few minutes, glancing into the mirrors to make certain that he was not being observed. He could see nobody, and that sixth sense that had so often saved him before told him he was clear.

Outside again, he walked back to the parking lot exit, strolling along the road that would take him onto the B-304. A few steps along this side road he saw a lane turning off to the right. On the wall, beside the lane, there was a notice warning of danger. This narrow road led out onto a smooth plateau that ended abruptly in rocky outcrops and a line of white warning poles. He could hear the river from practically anywhere around the Marienplatz, but now the roar was very close and, on reaching the wooden poles, he saw that he stood at the edge of a huge craggy cliff face. Two hundred feet below him, the waters of the river Inn snarled over more rocks.

The local Lovers’ Leap, he thought, retracing his steps and making his way back to the hotel, where the first person he saw was the elderly waiter who told him they had excellent Gänsebraten mit Karoffelknödeln for dinner. “People come from a long way to sample our roast goose with potato dumplings,” he added. “I should be quick into the dining room, or you will miss this delight.

Indeed, the goose was a delight, and the potato dumplings were probably the best he had ever tasted, but he left the table a little concerned, for Bavarian food, while tasty, could lie heavily on the stomach. His mind, however, dwelt on the strangers he had seen in the square on his way back to the hotel. Thugs, toughs, young men and women, many of the men with their heads shaved, all of them in various kinds of disreputable dress. The kind of louts, he thought, who over the past couple of years had made the German cities unsafe: attacking foreigners, firebombing synagogues, and marching in antigovernment protests.”

In the evening we had a great dinner in the Paulanerstuben’s restaurant. We had to “settle” for Wienerschnitzel, when you can only get goose with mashed potatoes from the restaurant in autumn, Alexander Hartung from the hotel told us.

“Finally he slipped away, walking back to the hotel across a deserted Marienplatz. There was nobody about in the hotel entrance, so he was able to get to his room unseen. Once there he took a quick very hot shower, cleaned off the lacerations in his arm, which looked slightly red and swollen, and made a more permanent bandage from a couple of handkerchiefs. He dressed in blazer and slacks and then returned downstairs again.”